watercolour

Watercolour and ink illustration of a fat brown babe wearing gems all over their top half and red bow suspended stockings. Crystals in puddles of pink frosting are on the ground while aqua bubbles float in the air as our hero makes a bubble.

Watercolour and ink illustration of 9 of my own heads all making different facial expressions.

Watercolour and ink illustration of a fat babe with gems on their chest, legs open to reveal shining crystals and a long lilac plait that twists around a mint stockinged leg.

Watercolour and ink illustration of two of my heads, the left making an exaggerated expression of disgust, the right looking off to the side with a blank expression.

I don’t have many words about these, I guess that’s why I draw pictures!

At first I wanted to draw empowering pictures but then I realised they were empty, almost lies. I’ve been avoiding my real self my whole life because I thought I wasn’t suitable. Confession is familiar, it keeps me in the dark; now I feel like it’s time to live transparently so I am drawing my secrets as if they were common knowledge.

Instagram of a pad with watercolour splotches and the text “Why would anyone choose to be ugly? Who gets to choose to be ugly?”

A pen and marker drawing on transparent polymer sheets of a fat white lady with lilac hair wearing a swimsuit and sporting tattoos, with floating men and food in her stomach.

I slightly resent having to find words to accompany things I’ve drawn. I guess I draw things so I don’t have to find words. I’m trying to find a new way to express the monstrous ugliness inside me, how it is a normal/ neutral thing in my mind but a feared, castigated and hidden set of traits on a cultural level. How there are ugly things I can get away with because I am white (having straight hair that I don’t brush, being typically white and pale), and other things I can’t get away with because I am fat (dressing sloppily, not visibly reducing my fatness, taking up space). How I perform femininity in acceptable ways (I like crafts and flowers) and obscene ways (too much make up). In private spaces I am very comfortable doing my own thing in my own body, slouching, picking zits, pulling faces, sitting with my legs open, burping; yet in public spaces I am extra vigilant in policing my posture, demeanor, behaviour, and dress. I hate being uncomfortable, and I resent having to hem myself in to make other people comfortable. Surely our culture would be better off doing away with the discomfort, the niceties, the shaming, and focusing more on not being dicks to one another.

A self portrait of me with dark brunette hair, squeezing a zit on my stretch marked breast. A purse with a floral china pattern spills out to the left and around me, and a banner with “nice white lady” stretches over me. In the background is a pattern of pink and purple fuchsias, and a doily shape on the lower right.

A dodgy panorama photo of lots of my recent drawings laid out on my bed.

You’ve been asking for prints for months and months and now I think I’m ready to deliver! Before I go ahead and order prints, it’d be really helpful to get an idea of which prints people would purchase and how many I should order.

You can vote as many times as you want, but please keep in mind that you should only check off art work that you’d buy pieces of (otherwise I’ll be ordering way too much and that will make me poor and sad!)

[polldaddy poll=”6249372″]

A watercolour and ink illustration of a white skinned woman wearing an assortment of pastry delicacies on her head in place of hair as she licks her upper lip.

Your sharp eye might have noticed a new drawing, or rather, a new version of an existing sketch! I illustrated Pastry Queen on A3 paper, adding even more pastries to her crusty bouffant.

If you are interested in buying any of the original art pieces, I’m open to selling them too. I’ve had interest for a number of pieces so I will be giving dibs to those who are first in!
A5 pieces are $140
A4 pieces are $210
A3 pieces are $280
Contact me here and let me know which piece of art you’d like to buy. (Postage and handling is extra.)

I’m not yet sure how much prints will cost but they will definitely be affordable. I can’t wait!
ETA
Don’t forget to sign up to the Fancy Lady Industries mailing list to find out when I reopen the shop and get prints in stock!

A pencil sketch of a fat lady wearing a ruffly top and knickerbockers.

Lately I’ve been looking through my sketchbooks and revisiting bits and pieces of drawings that I want to resolve to a point where I’m a bit happier with them. This fat lady sketch is from maybe 1-2 years ago when I was fascinated by fat lady sideshow performers.

A watercolour and ink illustration of a fat white skinned lady wearing a pink ruffly top and knickerbockers. A banner behind her says, "World's fattest lady... doesn't give a fuck."

And this is my resolved drawing. It only took… uh, forever! I changed her face so she looks more smug ;)

A watercolour and ink illustration of a fat person with a cow head wearing a floral dress and platform heels in some kind of glamorous running pose. A daisy strewn banner overhead says Fat Cow.

A watercolour and ink illustration of an orange and pink haired woman who is sticking her tongue out. Surrounding her are lots of small objects, like hamburgers and rainbows and narwhals and what not. A banner down the bottom says A Stranger on the Internet.

A watercolour and ink illustration of a woman with long brown hair with a curly pomp holding up a hand mirror. Text above says "Look at yourself!" and text on the mirror says "Stop looking at yourself".

A set of five handpainted matryoshka dolls, each doll painted with a different fat body. Also a tiny unicorn!

Sorry for the downtime over the last few days, Dreamhost is being an absolute turd at the moment!

A watercolour and ink illustration of a beehived green/blue haired babe wearing a pink top with a doily collar and red bow as they lick their upper lip.

A watercolour and ink self portrait of me holding a dripping nail polish brush and blowing my nails dry on my other hand, while wearing an orange bra. I have visible blemishes and stretchmarks over my body.

A watercolour and ink illustration of a teal haired fat babe's face with a languorous expression, dripping blush and lipstick and a donut necklace that says "Glutton". Various fat related insults fill the rest of the paper.

A watercolour and ink self portrait as I hold a pink iced donut up to one eye like a monocle.

A watercolour and ink illustration of a babe with fluro yellow hair (who looks like me, ha!) that contains the words "hard fance". Their make up is bold and they wear a bra with lots of tattoos that include a femme alien, a donut/ licorice/ doily/ leg chestpiece, lipstick and a milkshake.

A watercolour and ink illustration of a green/ purple gradient haired babe with braids and eyelashes so long they can be braided around their head.

Just a short post to deposit some of my latest creative thingies. I look at these images and feel like they were all done by different people, the styles are so seemingly disparate, but I kind of feel like I’m either looking for a new direction or feeling the need to branch out. It’s handy to have different styles to explore certain things, and as an illustrator and designer it allows me to work on my versatility. I remember reading something Stefan Sagmeister said about not being so concerned with having one certain identifiable style because his work is mostly about ideas and designing to solve problems. I quite like that.

A digital illustration of Aisha, a brown skinned plus size babe, walking with her cat Joe against a twilight skyline that includes the CN Tower.

This portrait was commissioned by Aisha for the banner of her new blog. I’d never drawn a cat up to this point and was pretty amazed that I captured her cute Himalayan so well!

A coloured pencil and watercolour drawing of Domonique, a white skinned babe with long brown hair and wears a hat blue flowers with a bird and nest in it. She poses with one hand behind her head and the other in front of her dramatically made up face.

A gouache painting of clumps of purple/ blue flowers against green foliage that is made up of tiny triangles.

I started experimenting with gouache paints earlier in the week and ended up painting all these triangles of different colours to learn about the colours and how to control tones. Triangles have been pretty “cool” over the last few years but they’re also good for building up forms without thinking too hard. I like how if I blur my eyes slightly I can actually see hydrangeas. On the other hand, I could never get the trick of magic eye puzzles.

About Natalie

I'm a fat, crafty lady who lives just outside Brisbane, Australia with my husband and my one-eyed dog. I'm an avid pen collector who holds funerals for them when they die. I've been wearing clothes since 1980 and sewing them since 1995.
I make jewellery and other trinkets and sell it all on Fancy Lady Industries.